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Something I missed for yesterday's
Weekend Roundup, but two TPM stories gave me pause:
White House Blames Obama for Trump Hiring Flynn, and
Obama Warned Trump Not to Hire Flynn as National Security Adviser.
Seems typical that Trump would do the opposite of what Obama recommended
then blame Obama when he turned out to be right. This illustrates the
extraordinary extent to which Trump has based his own agenda on the
desire to reflexively undo everything Obama has done over the past
eight years -- to effectively erase the Obama administration from
American history. Moreover, this contrasts sharply with Obama's own
considered efforts to maintain continuity when he replaced GW Bush,
despite the latter's dreadful legacy of failure.

I've long felt that Obama's emphasis on continuity was terrible
political strategy -- he gave up the option of continuing to blame
the lingering problems he inherited (like the Great Recession and
the continuing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq) on the person/party
responsible for them, he made it possible for Americans to forget
and forgive. The astonishing result was that two years later the
Republicans could surge back as the party of resentment against
America's corrupt elites. I've long felt that Obama cut not just
his own but his party's throat because he bought so deeply into
the myths of American Exceptionalism, and that compelled him to
rationalize and defend his country even when it had gone wrong.
Trump, clearly, has no such scruples or ideals, so it's hardly
surprising that his reflexive contempt of Obama so often strikes
against Obama's idealized America. One might expect his blind
contempt to backfire more often than it has, but unfortunately
the Democrats are still more inclined to defend their cherished
myths -- e.g., Hillary's "America's always been great" -- than
to recognize real problems, identify their causes, and propose
real solutions.

I'd also like to add that in thinking about the French elections
I posted a tweet, which I'll expand a bit here to get past the 140
character cramp:

One difference between elections in France and US is that French
media never let you forget Le Pen is a fascist, while US media never
notices our native fascism.

My point is that an honest recollection of what Republicans have
done and tried to do since Reagan would have shown them to be as
dastardly and disreputable as the Vichy-rooted National Front. But
the media insists on treating Republicans -- even ones as vile as
Trump, Cruz, and Ryan -- as respectable Americans, even though that
requires massive amnesia. I'm reminded once again of Tom Carson's
metaphor of America (embodied in the quintessentially all-American
Mary Ann) as a perpetual virgin, regrowing her hymen after every
act of intercourse. Unfortunately, the only people still suckered
by this myth of American purity are elite Democrats, and their
disconnection from reality is killing their party and sacrificing
their voters.

Not much to say about music this week. Rated count is down,
probably just because I've been slow, though I can point to
repairing a fence as a distraction, and I took a couple breaks
to make nice dinners-for-two (since our social entertaining
seems to have withered to nothing). I did find a good record
from Buffalo (one of my favorite towns) --
or perhaps I should say it found me. Among the
high B+ list (all jazz) the pecking order is probably: Fiedler,
Oh, Dickey, Durkin. Three of those came from Napster, as did
four jazz records from the next tier down (Preservation Hall,
Watson, the two Parker duos). Still have a couple dozen CDs in
the mail queue, but lately they haven't been amounting to much.
Still, this week's unpacking looks relatively promising.